What Only They Know
by Safely Away
Summary: No one knows what the Mockingjay knows, no one knows their song. Oneshot.


They have been here since the beginning.

They watched the people on the ground destroy themselves into a new nation that was equally as destructive. They flew through war ridden skies red as blood. They slept in the midst of evil.

One Mockingjay could not take flight because there was a red substance that clung to the sole of her claw. It had come from a man; a steady stream along the street upon which they fed when a bag of feed fell per good chance. Another, grief-stricken when he'd smelled the burning flesh of his mate being roasted on a spit, kissed by flames. Greedy bony hands tearing her apart until all that was left was a memory.

They had thought it was the last time any of them would be on fire. Never would they have thought a human would become one of them. How could they know that they carried the tune of an entire new nation on their feathered backs?

For many had forgotten they have withstood it all.

Like many others, they were just trying to survive. For did they forget that the birds were meant to die off too? They were mistakes of a dark past; the Jabberjays bred with mockingbirds, hoping to instill something that would ensure the species would live on. Even if in a new way. Even if it meant that instead of black feathers and pointed tails, their offspring would have a blue hue and white fans at their backs; but that was sacrifice. Giving a part of oneself to spawn something mightier. Something permanent. Something _good._

The Mockingjays were silenced, for they were brothers and sisters to the Avox kind, in a way. The birds could not do such a thing as speak, as their jabberjay fathers did, but they took after their mothers in song. In high pitches and low warbles and it was enough.

For no one knew what the Mockingjays knew.

No one knew their song.

It is a new world now. The Mockingjays can feel it.

They come out more, out of the brush of the woods, even sometimes. The sun warm their feathers and the dirt is softer; the coal dust no longer burns their beaks and dirties their heads. Their white downy bellies are fuller now and more of them take to the air but there is still a phantom dread that weighs their wings down.

And the bad days are not over, really. The birds do not think they will ever be over. A dark cloud of the past clings to the tips of the trees and deep beneath the sodden ground. Every once in awhile, a few eggs do not hatch. An agonizing mother squawks in an anguish that is painful to endure. Sometimes it doesn't rain for weeks on end and the woods are try, the bark peel, birds fall onto the ground with a thud and a crunch. But when it does come again, all is well. For the most part, they are content.

One day, a particularly elder Mockingjay flies overhead. He doesn't bother to try and keep up with the ones in formation a little ways further; this is his leisure time.

Over the meadow he dips and rises, eyeing a few people. Two of them, the taller ones sit, side by side and the smaller ones run and jump and fall in a glee the bird doesn't understand. But when he lowers, he recognizes the girl with the dark braid. The man she is with has yellow, finer hair than the man the bird recalled. For his own dark hair was lined with two strands of silver. The bird remembers the man's voice, as well. Light and pure but strong and beautiful. The bird perches on a nearby branch of a willow tree.

He remembers the tune the girl with the dark braid and the man sang long long ago and replays it. His voice isn't as smooth and as sharp as it was before but the girl freezes, raising her head and frantically searching for the origin of the sound. The Mockingjay chirps quietly to himself, she will not find him behind the leaves. She will not find the man who she was with in those earlier days before either, he is sure of it. He is a wise, bird. And finally, the girl slowly sits back in the grass. Her eyes are wet now as she tilts her chin to the sky. Even as a child, the bird thinks, she has always been strong. She sings the tune back but there is a waver in her voice.

The bird notches his beak and fluffs his feathers, knowing in some way what he has done is good, and takes off back into the air. A young laugh and a choked sigh, guide him into the clouds. He is content. And when he rejoins the group of others, floating in their joy, he is solemn and flaps his wings slowly.

Because no one knows what the Mockingjay knows.

No one knows his song.

* * *

 _A/N I decided to speak for the Mockingjays, even if only in a drabble. Thanks for reading :)_


End file.
